Let's Give All Children a Sound Learning Environment.

"We sometimes ask our teachers and students to operate in environments that we ourselves would not tolerate in our shopping malls, movie theaters, and daily work." That statement, made several years ago by Karen Woodward, superintendent in Anderson, S.C., came as the American Association of School Administrators was preparing a powerful study on school facilities titled Schoolhouse in the Red.

AASA's study placed at $100 billion the amount of deferred maintenance of school buildings in our nation. Several years later, the General Accounting Office pegged that figure at $112 billion.

This intolerable situation, brought on by an inadequacy and inequity in education funding, prompted Jonathan Kozol to write Savage Inequalities, a book replete with graphic examples of crumbling school buildings that stirred our nation's emotions.

In September, producers Jeffrey Hayden and Eva Marie Saint completed a PBS program titled "Children in America's Schools," which begins with documentary footage followed by a "town meeting." Narrated by noted journalist Bill Moyers, the two-hour program drew heavily from the work of Kozol and AASA. Like Kozol's Savage Inequalities, the program stands as a milestone in the long battle for adequate resources for children and schools.

The setting for this documentary was my home state of Ohio. I am proud to say that AASA's Executive Director Paul Houston and several AASA members--from school systems rich and poor, large and small--appeared on that program. Their common denominator was the need to "level up" school facilities and funding so that schools everywhere provide the best learning opportunities for all children, despite the wealth of the community where they happen to live.

In Ohio, the program reported, per-pupil expenditures range from $3,088 to $13,752. Sometimes, when our schools are in good repair, when we have ample computers and a stimulating learning environment, we may forget those who don't. That was not the case as local school leaders expressed their collective concern and raised their voices in favor of greater support for the education of all our children.

Consider striking while the iron is hot, using this magnificent tool to build support for repairing or replacing inadequate facilities. I urge you to get a low-cost copy of "Children in America's Schools" by calling 1-800-553-7752. You might use it at staff and community meetings as the starting point for your own town hall meeting.

I would also urge you to let PBS President Ervin Duggan (1320 Braddock Place, Alexandria, Va. 22314-1698) know how much you appreciate the program and would like to see it aired again.

Executive Producer Jeffrey Hayden said, "Children, given the opportunity to learn in a nourishing environment, will flourish. They will care more about school, they'll be less likely to drop out, they'll be excited about learning, and they will have the chance to succeed." During this historic program Paul Houston observed, "It's great to tell kids to pull themselves up by their own boot straps, but you'd better put boots on them first."

I know you share my pride in AASA's reaching out to the nation on behalf of an even better learning environment for all of our children.